Grave silence filled the building, suffocating in its weight. Their footsteps echoed down the empty corridors as they moved slowly toward their destination. Civilian felt uneasy. He knew the Shadows weren’t here now—they stayed buried deep in their hives during daylight, but he still couldn’t shake the feeling of being watched.


“What are we even looking for?” he whispered, barely audible, like he feared calling something forth by accident.


Soldier stopped in front of one of the many doors and looked back at him.

“We’re not looking for it,” he said. “Because we’ve already found it.”


He ran a gloved finger over a dusty metal plaque:

SURVEILLANCE CENTER.


The door wasn’t locked. With a push, it creaked open, a long, drawn-out groan that seemed to shudder down the whole hallway. Civilian instinctively pressed his back to the wall, watching sharply for any signs of movement.


Nothing.


They stepped inside a small room filled with monitors and server racks. Everything was coated in dust, cobwebs stretching from consoles to ceiling. The tech had clearly been dead for years.


“This doesn’t look promising,” Civilian muttered, stepping up to one of the cracked screens.

“Even if this ever worked... it’s long gone now..."


The sound of a zipper cut him off.


He turned and saw Soldier removing the heavy pack from his back, opening one of the inner compartments. He began pulling out a tangle of wires and connectors, clearly custom-made for exactly this equipment.


“You knew,” Civilian said flatly. “You knew all along what was here.”


“Pretty much,” Soldier replied, already working quickly.


Within minutes, one of the monitors flickered to life, first static, then image. Crumbling streets, ruined buildings, shadowed intersections. Some feeds were dead. But others...


Civilian squinted.


“No way,” he breathed.

“You brought the surveillance grid back online. How?”


Soldier patted the backpack. Hidden inside was a portable power unit, something he’d carried all this time for this exact moment.


He gestured at the screens. On several of them, the Shadows were moving. Slow, deliberate, like they were waiting. But in other locations, they were working. With eerie coordination. Purpose.


“This is what you wanted to see?” Civilian asked, eyes scanning the images.


Soldier pointed to one monitor in particular.

“No. They’re irrelevant. This is what I came for.”


Civilian leaned closer.


The camera showed a strange metallic structure in the middle of an underground complex, twisting tunnels of steel, cables, and something else... something he couldn’t quite identify through the grainy image.


“What is that?” he asked cautiously, even though part of him already knew.


“My real objective,” Soldier answered.


He checked the power lines, everything still running.


“But it won’t last. The batteries give us a few hours, max. We have to reach it before the lights go out again.”


Civilian straightened.

“And what are we looking for in there?”


Soldier met his eyes. There was a pause, a flicker of decision behind his gaze. Then, simply:

“A new beginning.”